‘13m Nigeria students face violence in schools’

The Plan International-Nigeria has raised concerns over recent statistics indicating that 13m Nigeria student’s face one form of violence or another in schools across the country.

The Advocacy and Youth Programme officer, Plan International-Nigeria, Jonathan Abakpa said this on Wednesday in Abuja during a Legislative and Policy Roundtable Dialogue on Gender-Based Violence in Education organised by Plan International Nigeria, Girls Get Equal Nigeria, European Union Youth Sounding Board and the House of Representatives Committees on Women Affairs and Basic Education Services.

It was themed: ‘Creating Safe and Equitable Educational Environments for All’.

He said that a breakdown indicates that 7m girls and 6m boys face violence from either their teachers or classmates while in school.

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He expressed fear that if the current trend is not reversed, the number of out-of-school children may increase from the current 18m to 20m.

“There is a current UNICEF report, which shows that seven million girls are facing one form of violence from their teachers or classmates. Over six million men or boys are equally facing the same,” he said.

Abakpa, who raised concern about the development noted that the statistics may be beyond that as there are no clear statistics for out- of school children or for children in informal education.

He said the dialogue was to engage with policy makers and critical stakeholders to discuss how policy and legislation can drive all forms of violence against girls.

While saying that the current repeal process of the Violence Against Persons Prohibition Act and the sexual harassment bill passed by the House of Representative and currently before the Senate, should be one that would strengthened policy and legislation.

“It is not enough for these policies to be repeal, amended and re-enacted, we want that commitment to come in the budgetary allocation, we are advocating for an increment in the education budget line in the 2025 appropriation bill. We want to see a situation where that will reflect in the enforcement of safe schools for girls and boys in general, we want a situation of seeing a deliberate commitment by the government in terms of ensuring security and citizens’ rights,” Abakpa said.

Also speaking at the event, National Coordinator of Girls Get Equal, Mrs Adokaji Odela, said there had been advocacies around GBV, thus the same requires redress.

She noted that engagement with stakeholders had led to the development of an accountability dashboard on cases of violence which has served as an opportunity to roll out their demands.